Today was mainly work. Spend the entire day at the conference / exhibition centre talking to potential vendors. The weather was hot and humid as there was a heatwave sweeping across the east coast of USA. KC was getting sore throat from all the heaty food and hot/dry weather.
Didn't go out for dinner, spent the evening at the hotel in front of the laptop and plasma TV ... :-)
Today was the first day of the Exhibition cum Conference. Along the way, we (my colleague, KC, and I) had McDonald's for breakfast. Using my PDA with the Baltimore map, we managed to make our way to the convention centre without too many wrong turns.
At the end of the day, we decided to drive around Baltimore's inner harbour area. With the help of the PDA map, we ended up at Locust Point where we visited Fort McHenry. Must have been a strange sight for the locals (mostly dressed in casual jogging and walking attire) to see 2 Chinese guys dressed in shirt and pants walking in the park snapping photos ...
After that, we had dinner at a place called L P Steamers (L P = Locust Point). Had crabcake, 2 medium crabs, a steamed seafood platter, pitcher of Mist and a chocolate cake, yum!
Fort McHenry Park Photos:
L P Steamers Photos:
This has got to be the longest travel time in my life. It took me 36 hours from boarding the plane to stepping into my hotel room in Baltimore! The journey summarised:
1. Singapore - Frankfurt (12 hours)
2. Frankfurt transit (2 hours)
3. Frankfurt - New York JFK (8 hours)
4. New York JFK Airport - Newark Airport (3 hours by "bone shaking" bus including waiting time)
5. Newark Airport (7 hours waiting for domestic flight)
6. Newark Airport - Baltimore Airport (2.5 hours including flight delay waiting on tarmac)
7. Baltimore Airport - Hotel (1.5 hours including bus, renting car, getting lost and reaching hotel)
In summary, I left on Sat night (Singapore time) and reached the hotel on Monday afternoon (Singapore time). In Wifey's own words, "I sleep 2 times you also haven't reach there!".
What's worse is Murphy showed up just as I reached Baltimore. My Nokia decided not to work, it can't be turned on after the plane landed. After swapping to my spare PDA phone, I don't get a signal. I think my Nokia killed my SIM card! :-(
So, no calls and SMS this week. Only Skype and Internet in the evening. BTW, Internet is also not cheap, USD9.95 per day.
More traveling in this coming week, will be off to the USA again, this time to Baltimore. Wonder how the place looks like, heard they have a nice harbour. Anyway, its for business so I guess won't have much time to catch the sights.
Anyway, will update more when I am there.
One of my CRT just went kaput a couple of days ago, so I am now the owner of a brand new Philips 22" widescreen (1680x1050) LCD! :-D
LCD prices are really dropping, I bought the 22" for almost the same price as my other 19" about half a year ago. 19" screens from well known brands such as ViewSonic, Philips, LG and Samsung can be had for under $400. The 22" can be as low as $419! (ViewSonic)
